Since job action began late last week, BCNU has received more than 1,400 reports from nurses across British Columbia describing what the union says are attempts by health employers to intimidate members and interfere with their legal right to participate in job action.

Nurses have come forward to say they are being threatened with discipline, warned their professional licences could be at risk and pressured to perform non-nursing duties or work unauthorized overtime despite the union's lawful job action directives.

BCNU President Adriane Gear says the volume and consistency of these reports from health-care facilities across the province are deeply concerning and represent a troubling disregard for the collective bargaining process.

"We're hearing from a concerning number of nurses who simply want to exercise their legal right to participate in job action, yet they're being met with intimidation, threats and misinformation," says Gear. "No nurse should be made to feel afraid for standing up for safer workplaces, better retention and a stronger public health-care system."

In response, BCNU is expanding job action later this week. As previously announced, a picket line will begin at Vancouver General Hospital on Tuesday morning. Beginning Thursday, July 9, at 5:30 a.m., additional picket lines will be established at Surrey Memorial Hospital and the Jim Pattison Outpatient Care and Surgery Centre. Essential services will remain in place throughout the job action to protect patient safety.

"Nurses do not want to see patient care impacted," says Gear. "Every decision we've made throughout this process has been guided by our commitment to protecting patients and maintaining essential services. But when employers refuse to respect nurses' legal rights and instead choose confrontation over meaningful engagement, they leave us with no choice but to increase the pressure."

The union is calling on the provincial government to intervene, saying health employers have demonstrated they are unwilling or unable to resolve the dispute while continuing to undermine lawful job action.

"Government cannot stand by while health employers blatantly retaliate against nurses’ lawful job action," says BCNU CEO and NBA Chief Negotiator, Jim Gould. "Nurses have taken measured, responsible steps and are asserting their rights. Health employers must respect that process, and government must ensure they have both the mandate and the direction to negotiate a fair agreement."

The current job action follows a historic strike vote in which 50,850 nurses participated, with 98.2 per cent voting in favour of strike action. Members later rejected a tentative agreement by 67 per cent, signalling that the government's bargaining mandate failed to address nurses' priorities, including meaningful wage improvements, retention, workplace safety and solutions to the ongoing nursing shortage.

"Nurses didn't choose this," says Gear. "Every nurse would rather be at the bedside than on a picket line. But we cannot accept a situation where nurses are intimidated for exercising their legal rights while the issues driving the nursing shortage remain unresolved. The government has the ability to change the course of these negotiations, and we're calling on them to do so before further escalation becomes necessary."